Rand Paul's Annual 'Festivus Report' Reveals $900B Wasted on Insane Federal Projects

Tis the season...for Festivus! And that means Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) is out with his annual report through which he airs his spending grievances about the federal government's waste of taxpayer dollars as the national debt grew from $30 trillion to almost $34 trillion in 2023.

"This year, members of both parties in Congress voted to raise the debt ceiling, which empowered the government to borrow an unlimited amount of money until 2024," Paul reminded in his Festivus report. "As Congress spends to reward its favored industries and pet projects, the American taxpayers are forced to pay the price through record high inflation and crippling interest rates."

Even worse, Paul noted that the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) now "predicts we will add an average of $2 trillion in debt annually for the next decade" which means the federal government will "add over $5 billion of debt every single day for the next ten years" as we "borrow over $200 million every hour, we borrow $3 million every minute, and we borrow $60,000 every second."

Yikes. And what do Americans get for all that spending and debt? Not much. Senator Paul's 2023 Festivus Report highlights "a whopping ~$900,000,000,000 of waste, including an NIH grant to study Russian cats walking on a treadmill, Barbies used as proof of ID for receiving COVID Paycheck Protection Program funds, $6 million to promote tourism in Egypt, and $200 million to 'struggling artists' like Post Malone, Chris Brown, and Lil Wayne."

"No matter how much money the government has already wasted, politicians keep demanding even more," Senator Paul emphasized. "As always, taking the path to fiscal responsibility is often a lonely journey, but, as I’ve done in years past, I will continue my fight against government waste this holiday season."

In a statement, White Coat Waste Project's Senior Vice President Justin Goodman noted that "Senator Rand Paul’s epic Festivus Report provides a reliable roadmap of reckless government spending, and we’re honored that he included our exposé of wasteful taxpayer funding of Putin’s cat lab that ultimately ended the project as well as our investigations of Fauci’s Monkey Island and BeagleGate scandals, the NIH’s meth head and gambling monkey tests and USDA’s silly walking hot dog experiment."

"A growing majority of taxpayers—Republicans, Democrats, and Independents alike—oppose Uncle Sam’s wasteful, dangerous, and cruel animal experiments at home and abroad and don’t want to be forced to pay billions for these boondoggles," Goodman emphasized of his group's findings. "We’re proud to work with Sen. Paul on bipartisan efforts to find, expose, and defund $20 billion in wasteful government animal experiments in the U.S., Wuhan, and hundreds of other labs overseas. The way to get the feds out of the animal testing business is simple: Stop the money. Stop the madness!"